The Way Back Ch. 01

A warning to the unwary. This is a long story that unfolds slowly as a man seeks to regain his life. It is in 10 parts containing 53 chapters all of which are completed and will be submitted daily. After that it's up to Literotica.

It is written in British English.

Though it is told in the first person. It is not autobiographical, but fiction. Any resemblance to, or names of, real persons is accidental. Many of the places, however, do exist, though some liberties have been taken.

There is sex in a number of different relationships, all such acts are between characters over 18 years of age.

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ONE

I'm still not right. Never will be. I don't mean right or wrong; I mean healthy. At least I remember now, apart from the actual days it happened. Those days are still blank.

"You are a very rare case," said my doctor. "Apart from those with permanent memory loss, practically every case gets memory back after a few months, and to lose your identity for so long... but then we've not seen anyone else survive after the hammering your brain took."

Big deal. So I'm a rare case. It doesn't help; hasn't helped. Of course I'm much better now; I remember most things and people from before the injury except, as I say, the day of the injury itself. My short-term memory is still improving even after all this time. Sometimes it lapses and I panic, but I carry about my little electronic pad, and it tells me the most important things. Keeps me on track.

But I am anticipating. Let's start at the beginning. Settle down, it's a long story.

They told me what they knew at the hospital, Newcastle-upon-Tyne General. They were very patient, telling me the story over and over again, and over and over again I forgot it. Gradually it stuck.

I had been rushed into hospital on the twenty fourth of August 2001. Someone had phoned the ambulance, which saved my life. I was in a very bad way: I had been badly beaten, ending up on a patch of waste ground.

Badly? My face had been thoroughly mashed and probably stamped on, and my skull was fractured. Most of my teeth were gone, my nose was a pulp, my jaw and cheeks broken. That was only my head.

My neck had suffered, my voice box slightly damaged. Ribs, one thigh and a shin on the other leg broken, kneecaps damaged and both ankles the same. There were some internal injuries upon which they operated: the thugs had concentrated on my head. It was clear to everyone that the thug or thugs had tried to kill me, and more than that had tried to obliterate my face.

My balls were bruised: they must have got a few kicks to my backside. I must have got into a foetal position because my penis remained untouched. We need to be thankful for small mercies, laughed the doctor. Joke. No comment.

Everything I had on me was stolen. In an attack of prudishness they left me my underpants, but that was all. The police, world-weary as always, were assuming it was a mugging carried to extremes, or that I was involved in some shady dealings in the underworld. It didn't change the outcome. Apparently they took my fingerprints but it turned out I was innocent. No records.

However, my injuries were the worst any of the medics had ever seen, and no one thought I would live. I was on life support in a deep coma for six months, but no relatives came forward to give permission to switch off the life-support. Not surprising perhaps; I had no identification on me, and I was not talking! So, at last, the hospital went to court to get permission to discontinue life-support. It took weeks to be resolved in the hospital's favour.

When they did turn it off I carried on breathing! A month later I began very slowly to come round, and all that legal stuff had been useless. So I survived one attempt by thugs, and another by the medical profession to kill me.

I came round slowly as I said; it took months. Gradually I began to make some sort of response to the prodding and pinching they did to assess my consciousness. I was at a very rudimentary level; I could not speak. I had to begin to learn to talk again. I didn't know how to do anything -- I mean anything.

An additional problem was that I had no memory and didn't know who I was. Neither did anyone else. I had been unconscious or semi-conscious for nine months in different levels of coma, and two more months regaining what most would call consciousness.

Then came long months of rehabilitation. I was a rare case because I had no memories at all, not even my name, a condition which was almost unheard of. The medics and the police later thought I was pretending, since it was unusual for memory loss to extend to identity; I had something to hide, probably the reason I was beaten up.

I learned to understand, to talk, to walk, to read, to dress myself, to wash and to use the toilet, not necessarily in that order! Much later I learned to write. The pain was intense and the struggle long and dispiriting. My emotional life was all to pot as well. I was by turns aggressive and docile, optimistic and deeply depressed, but utterly and doggedly determined, I am told.

Nearly two years after my admission I was physically fit enough to leave rehabilitation although I was still crippled, walking on crutches with pins in bones, but because my short-term memory came and went I was not able to live alone, so I had to remain at the rehab centre.

Some memory began to return: I had vivid nightmares the details of which I couldn't remember shortly after I awoke, and there were flashes which I couldn't understand.

I remembered "no 'H', two 'Ls' and two 'Ss'". It made no sense.

They called me Aled Jones after the Welsh Tenor. It was a joke: they'd heard me singing in the shower. It was heavy irony also, for with my voice no one would want to hear me sing. As it happened the initials AJ were just right but no one knew that.

My body and face had been reconstructed over the months while I was comatose. I was grateful for that because it had saved me some of the pain. However, my face looked a mess; I mean my own reflection frightened me! I wondered from time to time what I used to look like before. The medics had done what they could; mustn't grumble. The female nurses used to say it gave me a unique charm, a rugged attractiveness. I was not taken in.

The thing was, I was obsessive about making progress. At least that is what they told me. I would get frustrated and angry, to the extent of throwing things around when I was not improving fast enough. It did mean that my doggedness made me progress more quickly.

I did puzzles, I walked and walked on my crutches and tried to walk without them too early, with disastrous results. I don't think I was nice to know. One thing I took to immediately was the computer they got me.

To help my short-term memory, I wrote everything that I needed to remember into my computer diary. There were emerging memories of childhood. For instance it came to me out of the blue that I lived in the Manchester area, not Newcastle.

Don't get the idea that I was all alone in all this. One nurse in particular took a special shine to me. She was the one who would come and visit me as I lay in hospital before I could walk. She held my hand and stroked it when I felt I couldn't go on any more. After she was moved to another department, she continued to come and see me.

Her name was Patricia Mary O'Toole. With her devilish sense of humour, she used to say that without the 'O' in O'Toole she'd have been a mental wreck. Get it? Initials PMT? Pre-Menstrual Tension? Never mind.

Trish had no trace of an Irish accent, after all she was born and brought up on Tyneside and her accent came from there. I found it delightful. She called me 'pet' and 'hinny', and had a way of injecting me with optimism when the pain and stress were at their worst.

She was a tall, slim girl, about twenty-five, perhaps a little older, pretty with a good figure; I suppose you might call it 'understated hour-glass'. She had a nice pert bottom which balanced her nice pert tits. She had thin but shapely legs. Auburn hair.

I wondered about her private life since she spent so much time with me, but she said she had no family left in Britain and she was not into relationships. She liked casual flings when she felt horny, but no strings.

She would regale me with stories about going out on Saturday nights in winter, wearing a skimpy top, micro-skirt, tiny knickers and high heels, 'on the pull' as she put it. It was not unusual for girls in Newcastle to do that, she said. It made me feel cold just to think about it! She did not go into sexual details.

To allow me to leave rehab she found me a flat and moved in with me, leaving her own flat for a while. She bustled round the flat, tidying up or making meals when I couldn't be bothered or was feeling too depressed to do anything. Once she was sure I could be left, she returned to her flat, but visited me daily, staying over some nights.

The other thing she did, and to that I owe my ability to tell this tale, she bought me a cheapish laptop computer (the hospital wouldn't let me keep theirs) and suggested that every night, and sometimes during the day, I should write everything that I did that day. It would help my memory, she told me, because I could go over previous day's activities repeatedly. She pointed out wryly that I had plenty of time on my hands.

So I began to keep a diary. At the beginning it took me a long time to write, but soon I became more adept at typing. Just as well, for my writing was very poor indeed: my co-ordination was all to pot. As my typing became more fluent and the pain in my hands decreased, I moved from only describing actions to discussing motives and making conjectures.

I have kept my diary ever since, a few minutes each night, and it is to that diary and the contributions of others you owe my story.

Initially Trish did my shopping but began to suggest that I try to do it myself. Now I was visiting the hospital twice a week and I hated the short journey there. It was hard work on crutches, and I longed to be able to shield my face; I was embarrassed and ashamed of it. The expressions on people's faces when they looked at me: disgust, fear and worst of all pity, all reinforced those feelings. So I contrived to stay at home. It was Trish who tried everything to get me out, I suspected so that I would get used to the stares. The hours she spent over me!

It was ironic that I strove so hard in every other aspect of my rehabilitation while trying to duck that one aspect of it.

Trish and I talked about all sort of things but I would often bring the conversation back to one thing. I would complain and moan that apart from her there was no one who would ever want to live with me, marry me or even have a fling, unless they were in some sense perverted. She would sigh her disagreement and change the subject.

One day she snapped.

"I'm sick of hearing you moaning on about being ugly. You guys might look only at women's bodies but most girls are attracted to the sort of guy a bloke is. You are a nice man, Aled. The other nurses admired you, you have guts and determination and some of them fancied you. Why? For your qualities: you were thoughtful, considerate, gentle with them but hard on yourself, single minded, driving yourself hard."

I smiled wryly. "Oh, yeah? Did you see how that check-out girl looked at me at the supermarket? She was repulsed."

"OK," she said decisively. "It's obvious you have no confidence. You don't believe what I say. You've been having therapy. Tomorrow night we begin some different therapy."

I groaned. Therapy was the excruciatingly hard work at the rehab centre twice a week, and self-inflicted for the rest of the time. It hurt like hell and wore me out.

"Don't knock my therapy until you've tried it!" she said smiling as she left for work.

That night she arrived at the flat in her raincoat. It was April. When she took it off, which unusually she did in front of me, she revealed what she was wearing underneath. Not much as it happened.

Her hair was piled high on her head. She wore a tee shirt with a deep 'V' at the front which was cropped to finish just under her breasts. It was sheer, silky, semi-transparent red material and under it, quite visible, was a black half-cup, 'push-up' bra. Her navel was pierced, her skin toned and her waist exquisitely shaped -- those smooth curves! The pleated micro-skirt was just long enough to cover her behind. No stockings or tights but three inch high heels completed the outfit. She twirled for me, her skirt flared out and her black lacy French-cut knickers flashed me.

There was a stirring and a growing down below.

Don't get me wrong, I had 'discovered' my penis and its potential for giving me pleasure and cheering me up, though I tend to think there is something instinctive in that! Trish had also rented DVDs, some of which were of explicit sex. She never spoke of them and I never commented on their content.

"Am I making any sort of impression?" she asked sarcastically.

"Oh yes, Trish. Definitely. Another twirl?"

She obliged. Her bum was so rounded, her cheeks peeking out below the panties! She was truly lovely.

"Now listen, Aled pet, what we do tonight and on future nights -- the therapy will take some repetition -- is strictly 'no strings'. I do not want a permanent relationship with you, not because of your face but because I don't do relationships.

"We can have fun together and it won't do your confidence any harm at all. I'm doing this because I fancy you rotten. Don't forget, I've seen your prick at rest and standing to attention! This is partly selfish on my part. Speech over; time for action!"

I struggled to stand up, my erection proudly pushing out my trousers. She looked and smiled with what I began to hope was lust.

"Good! I notice there's nothing wrong with his short term memory! He hasn't forgotten what he's for!"

She walked ahead of me into the bedroom, her hips swaying. I reckoned she was putting it on for my benefit but I was not complaining. As soon as we were by the bed she twirled again -- another glimpse of those hidden knickers -- and dropped to her knees in front of me. With all the alacrity of a hedonistic nurse, she undid, unzipped and pulled my trousers down, following them with my briefs, carefully working them over my erection. Then she stood and lifted off my tee shirt. I stood nude save for my socks in all my mutilated glory.

"Sit on the bed," she ordered, though gently.

She removed my socks. Now I was completely naked and my turgid prick was standing tall, urgently begging for attention.

"You know what to do?" she asked, as she shimmied her French knickers down her thighs and unclipped her skirt, letting it fall to the floor.

I nodded, gazing for the first time at her closely cropped pudenda with rapt admiration. I was probably dreaming but I could have sworn she blushed.

"The basics," I said.

"That's all we need this time," she laughed as she crawled onto the bed and lay down, spreading her legs wide and giving me an unrestricted view of her pussy. Her outer lips covered the inner folds but I could see they were enlarged with expectation of what was to follow. There was a sheen of dampness along the slit.

"Come on then," she ordered briskly. "For now just stick it in and see if you can fuck me. Don't worry; just do your own thing."

She hadn't taken off her top and in a way that was even more erotic.

I got on the bed and knelt between her legs. It hurt my knees even on the softness of the duvet, but I persevered, who wouldn't? She was looking at me expectantly rather than lustfully.

I put my hands on her knees and froze. The sensation of her skin was mesmerising, so soft and yet tight and firm. Some say the skin of the inner thigh is the softest on the body, and my hands were stroking up hers. It was the nearest thing to ecstasy I knew. I stroked down to her crotch and up again to her knees, over and over again.

"Oh Trish," I breathed, "the feel of your skin! It's heaven!"

My stroking had had an effect: her eyes were closed and a sigh escaped her (upper) lips. So I carried on until, as I reached her vulva for the umpteenth time, her hand snaked out and took mine. She guided it into her cleft and, taking my finger, traced round and round a little knob. She let go and I continued the routine, but soon I wanted to explore further and slipped the finger along her crease to the other end, where I found that place where the men on the DVDs pushed in their huge bald cocks into the women's gaping bald pussies.

I didn't push my finger in, but retraced its path to stroke the other way, discovering there were inner lips. It triggered a memory of a DVD where a woman lay with her vulva open to inspection. I reached her little knob and circled it again until she cried out and began to convulse.

"Oh yes!" she cried. "Now Aled, now!"

What did she mean? Fuck her, or was it simply appreciation?

She clarified. She grabbed my prick and pulled it towards her sex. I followed -- no choice really -- trying to ignore the twinges in my knees. She lined me up and I pushed in, stretching out my legs. That felt better. Another breathtaking experience! The feel of the walls of her warm moist sheath as I began to move! I was rapt in the sensation, slowly moving within her to and fro, to and fro. My eyes had been closed the whole time, and when I opened them I was looking into hers. She was laughing gently.

"Aled, you are the sort of lover every girl wants! You appreciate every sensation so much, and you move slowly; you stroke, but for now please speed up."

I smiled with a hint of embarrassment as I tried to find a painless way to fuck her. I raised myself on my arms, and as I speeded up my thrusting there was that familiar gathering. I slowed to make it last longer, speeded up again getting myself to the edge, then backing off, until at last I had to take it over the brink and I came, shuddering and gasping for breath.

I kissed her, and she kissed back.

"I never expected to have an orgasm first time with you," she said appreciatively, "and your fucking is the best. It's usually 'wham, bam, thank you mam'. Even when I stay the night, most blokes don't seem to know the first thing about the female orgasm."

"So, are we going to have more therapy?" I asked hopefully.

"Oh yes! And for the time being I'm going to swear off other blokes. By the way," she added, "all the blokes I've been with have worn condoms."

"But not me?"

"Aled, I know you've not been with anyone for nearly three years, so I know you're clean. We can do it bareback and it feels great!"

"Trish, they reckon I'm in my mid-forties and you're in your twenties. Aren't I too old for you?"

"As I said Aled," she winked at me, "this is no strings sex and I don't care about your age, you're good at it."

She stayed the whole night in my bed. The following morning there was more therapy.

Over the next few weeks she would come round often and we'd have sex.

The pain in my knees began to decrease. I put it down to the sanctifying effect of the missionary position. In addition to the actual fucking, I would do what came naturally, and without remembering anything I did it correctly. I liked stroking her back. She liked it. I liked nibbling her ears. She liked it. I massaged her feet. She loved it. The backs of her knees? Great! Her armpits. Superb! This in addition to the usual things, breasts, lips, vulva, arse, buttocks. I was in heaven. It struck me later that I had been lucky enough to have been a virgin twice!

She complimented me all the time. What a great lover I was! I must have made some woman very happy, she enthused.